Have you ever arrived for an appointment at the correct time only to be told the person you are seeing is running late? I’m sure that has happened to you on many occasions. In the story I’m about to relay to you, this incident happened to one of my clients recently.

Gary and his wife arrived to see this health professional at the appointed time. The receptionist had even confirmed the time the day before. On arrival at the health clinic they were told the practitioner was running 30 minutes late. The reason being that the first appointment for the day had arrived late due to heavy traffic so consequently every other appointment was set back.

Mary is a typical small business owner, she keeps herself busy doing the ‘hands on’ work. In her case it is doing beauty treatments and she told me she keeps doing this because she really enjoys it.

Her clients constantly told her how great she was, which made her feel appreciated. However it trapped her into staying ‘on the tools’. Mary had 5 people on her team, and she struggled with letting them handle her clients. She also complained that it was challenging finding competent people. Mary stayed up late most nights working on her business doing the basic administration and ‘trying’ to squeeze some time in for marketing. There was barely any time for her to spend with her husband.

Do you ever feel it’s just too hard being in your own business?

You’re sick of dealing with people problems, worrying about paying the bills, hoping that new prospect will finally become a client, staying awake at night concerned that the money you’ve invested in that special project may work and you’ll be in more debt than ever?  That nothing you do seems to be working?

There’s been many times over the past 12 years that I’ve felt no matter what I did,it wasn’t giving me the results I was looking for and could easily have thrown it all in.  It’s during these times that you need to get the strength from within to keep going.

Gary has a business, employing 7 staff. When he contacted me he was at a point where the stress from his business was so bad, that he would constantly wake up 3 or 4 times a night worried about everything …his cash flow, staff, lack of clients and the affect all this was having on his personal well-being and family life.

He didn’t use a diary, had no way of planning and kept everything ‘in his The Productivity and Profit Homestudy System head’. Often his staff were idle because he hadn’t spent time training them. That ensured the work didn’t get done therefore causing Gary to lose clients.

What are you focussing on achieving in your business in the next 90 days?

Do you have any idea? If you don’t then you better come up with a goal or outcome otherwise you may find that another 3 months has passed you by and you’re no further ahead than where you are right now.

When you’ve got a clear focus, you can easily say ‘no’ to activities and people who distract you.

Simple things like turning email and mobiles off, closing the door, working elsewhere and only having what you need to on your desk all help to stay focussed. However there’s often other areas that take you off track. ..and that you can be completely oblivious to!